The Scent Lives On

It's Friday night and I'm at home, sipping a bottle of Westerly Vineyards 2002 Estate Grown Cab Franc Merlot blend. I decided to relax at home and sip some nectar from heaven... as I wandered to my DVD player to pop in another flick, I caught a whiff of ultra rich vanilla. It was coming from the christmas candles I burned until they smothered, and it made me want to write a bit.

Don't you hate it when your container candle burns "all the way" yet there's wax left along the sides? As a candle maker, let me say, I feel your pain but there's just no controlling the flame. I am not infallible, but generally do an excellent job of centering the wick. I always use the specified wick size for the width of the jar because there's no way I'm going to risk my product heating the jar until it shatters. And so, I suppose the unavoidable side effect is a bit of remaining wax. I recommend burning tea light candles inside this remaining "shell" of wax until the jar is as wax free as possible. I am currently experiencing the reality that there is plenty of leftover scent which can be released with the help of a tea light.Thinking about burning every last drop of wax in each jar candle also got me thinking about what to with the jars after that. I'm excited about the fact that I'm saving the earth a bit of carbon dioxide for each reused jar that I make a candle in... if I had bought a brand new one, another five to fifteen ounces of CO2 would have been released into the atmosphere, depending on how much recycled glass had been used to create that particular jar. Making a glass container from 100% raw materials uses about 40% more energy, so there is both a cost and environmental savings to recycling. (I've been reading up on my statistics the past few weeks.)

The reason I'm rambling about all this is because I think it is important to give my jars another life after the candle no longer burns. My first thought was that the soy wax isn't very porous, so it could possibly be scraped out with a butter knife or spoon. I have also found a few suggestions on the internet, one involving your microwave and the other using a vegetable steamer... I'm not sure I'm thrilled with any of the options at this point, but when my current jar candles finish burning I'm going to try them out and document the process. There are so many things these containers can be reused for. Obviously at my house I can make another candle, but they could store candy, buttons, jewelry, coins... or you could use some as flower vases. If you have enough jars around the house, then put them out with the recycling trash so they can find new life as an ingredient in concrete or fiberglass. There is no limit to the number of times glass can be recycled, so don't let the cycle stop with you... stay tuned for jar cleaning instructions.

One week, one order, one pledge, one recipe

It's hard to believe the first week of the year has already come and gone. I've already gotten my first wholesale order of the year - thank you Hemp Wise - which begins the ticker for dollars pledged to the Environmental Defense Fund. This order will mean a future donation of approximately $5... it sounds small, but I think the number will be much larger when I finally tally it up and make the first payment and I'm excited to be supporting a cause with my work. I didn't find time for any marketing this week, on account of having a cold and being busy enough just making, labeling and wrapping candles for Hemp Wise. So far I've made Red Currant, Rustic Woods and Oceanside... tonight I will make the final batch, pomegranate spice.

I also did a bit more cooking, through the week... glass jars are accumulating slowly. I thought I would share my newest potato salad concoction with you. It's loaded with vitamins and contains much less fat than traditional recipes thanks to the addition of greek yogurt.

1 bag baby gold potatoes

1 - 12 oz jar roasted red bell peppers - diced

1 shallot - diced

6 oz greek yogurt

2 Tbsp mayonaise

olive oil

Wash the potatoes then put them in a large pot, fill with water and put it on the stove. Bring water to a boil, reduce heat and simmer until potato skins begin to crack open (approx 40 min.). Drain and cool.

While potatoes are cooking, heat approximately 2 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil in a skillet on low heat. Add finely diced shallots and stir frequently. Cook 2 min or until lightly browned.

Once potatoes have cooled 5 - 10 minutes, pour in a casserole, use a fork to break into smaller chunks, then stir in yogurt, shallots, mayonaise and diced roasted red bell pepper. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Allow mixture to cool on the counter 20 - 30 minutes before placing in the refrigerator to prevent condensation from watering down your chilled potato salad. Enjoy!

Moisturizer, Mushrooms & Mustard

You know how people will allways tell you to choose your job wisely, because you spend more hours of your life at work than anywhere else? I believe that now I understand the full significance of that statement. I love my day job, don't get me wrong, but I've seen pieces of my lifestyle change recently, all in order to create more candles. Every time I go shopping for anything lately I find myself thinking, "Hmmmm.... Would this make a good candle when I'm done with it?" I picked out a new lipgloss / hand salve combo just because it came in a really cute tin. Apple juice and frappuccino are now my two favorite caloric beverages, because their jars are so cute. Also, I've begun cooking real meals for myself again, both because it tastes better & cost less than frozen entrees and pre-packaged salads, and because it creates more jars to recycle into candles later. And, since I generally combine my jar packaged foods with local produce and other ingredients, I can only assume I have reduced my carbon footprint to some degree.




Last week I had a yummy pesto pasta salad which was quick and easy to throw together and I thought I'd share the recipe with you. Sorry, I forgot to take a photo, but will do so next time!

Rachel's Chicken Pesto Pasta Salad

1 lb - approx 3 chicken breasts

1 - 8.5 oz jar sun dried tomato pesto sauce

1 - 12 oz package tri-color rotini or other pasta

1 bag mixed salad greens

olive oil

balsamic vinegar


Place the chicken breasts in a pot of water with 1 tsp salt and bring to a boil. Reduce heat & simmer approx 20 minutes or until cooked through. Cut to see the middle of the chicken breast to check for doneness before draining and rinsing with cold water. Allow chicken to cool 10 - 15 minutes then shred.


At the same time, boil a pot of water for your pasta and cook according to the directions on the package. Mix entire jar of pesto sauce & shredded chicken with pasta when done. Cool on counter uncovered for a bit if needed to avoid steam accumulation, then cover and chill in the fridge for a minimum of 30 min before serving.


Serve over mixed salad greens lightly drizzled with olive oil and balsamic vinegar.

This week I will be eating lots of peanut butter & jelly sandwiches for breakfast, perhaps a salad with dijon mustard dressing for lunch, relying on the constant standby - hot pasta - in the evenings, and working on a salad invention to use up the adoreable jars of shitake mushrooms I found on clearance at Gelson's last weekend.


But don't worry, I'm not going to attempt to provide every needed recycled jar from my personal inventory. I already have a few friends who save their jars for me in return for a 20% friend discount whenever they order, and I have plenty of other ideas I'm working on for how to collect more jars from strangers. An infathomable amount of energy is consumed in the aquisition of raw materials for and the production of glass jars each year. Americans burn countless numbers of glass container candles annually, in addition to vast amounts of packaged foods they consume. I hope others will agree it is time we reuse everything we can. Together we can help preserve the environment and slow global warming. Furthermore, to show that I am serious about my commitment to the cause, I will be donating 5% of all gross retail and wholesale sales in the indefinite future to the Environmental Defense Fund. Happy New Year everyone! Cheers to moisturizer, mushrooms and mustard and their re-usable packaging!

Another year gone by...

The remainder of 2009, from the time of my last posting, is a bit of a blur. As I recall, I was intertwined in my new recycled jar decoupage candle project for the remainder of the month of August. Every surface of my studio apartment was covered with recycled jars in one stage or another of the process. The tidiness of my living area might not have been compromised nearly so harshly if I had come up with a more systematic plan for accomplishing my project. But, I let my overambitious, A.D.D. admiring brain take charge… and after spending the first half of September searching for my countertops and floor underneath piles of craft supplies, I decided to listen to the logical & scattered-yet-organized part of my brain that said it was time to undertake my annual apartment re-organization. (Every year I come up with a slightly better plan for arranging my tiny studio to make it more functional and hopefully a bit more stylish as well.) This year it took approximately one month of my time digging through my possessions and choosing what to let go of, one evening with friends moving furniture, and a second hand dresser from my parents that just happened to fit the new arrangement I’d been imagining perfectly.

Let’s just say it took longer than I thought to get my apartment in order. It’s hard to find time for hours and hours of cleaning when you have a busy social life and a full time job! Oh, and did I mention I procrastinate sometimes? Anyhow, before I knew it, it was the end of November… prime candle selling season… and I had done nothing to promote my products for Christmas. I was trying not to feel guilty about it, but rather to think proactively about what I could still do, when a friend invited me to a Holiday Open House / Craft Fair at a woman’s house in town. After attending said event, I couldn’t help but think that the best thing I could do for my business this year would be to take advantage of my newly re-organized apartment and host my own holiday open house. I thought about it for a few days, then chose a date and hit the ground running.

It turned out that making the choice to plan an open house would be the catalyst for this season’s sales. The first thing I did was to start making as many candles as possible to put out on display at the party. Since I finally had fresh products available, I took photos of them and created some new listings for my website… something else that was a bit neglected in 2009, though not near as much as this blog… and I sold a few candles online, weeks before the open house. I see each purchase as a little piece of encouragement, a ray of hope for future sales if you will. I am still unsure why every year I have to remind myself that the more items I post to my website, the more likely I am to sell something… especially on a web community like mine where the most recently listed items show up first in the search results. I’m putting a demerit in my own employee file for forgetting that again.


The online orders were really just the appetizer of the season though. I finally found the motivation to re-do my candle labels! I’ve begun printing my own and feel that my new packaging looks much more professional. The holiday party was not a huge success in and of itself – I blame myself for planning something at the last minute during a month when everyone is busy every weekend – but I did have a few visitors who enjoyed some Irish Whiskey and sweets while perusing my current candle & soap lines. Furthermore, several people who couldn’t make it to the party responded to the evite asking if they could see my products at a different time. So, I set up a mobile candle shop in the back of my Honda CRV… and that turned out to be the real moneymaker of the season. I can’t say that it was my ideal sales situation… having to cart baskets & bags of candles back & forth from my car, making sure they stay shaded so the colors & scents don’t fade, filling up the gas tank more than my usual weekly allotment to allow for the extra weight and mileage… but I had a surprising amount of fun doing it. My favorite moment was when my friend caught a stranger eyeing us like she was ensuring there was no drug deal taking place on her watch and we invited her over to see the candles. The woman did buy a candle, but I still think she may have been nudged by the guilt of having looked at us so accusingly.


So, what now? Christmas is over, but people everywhere will still be burning candles for months, especially in the colder parts of the country & world. The year-round challenge of how to get more customers to my website continues. I have greatly increased my presence on Facebook and have begun offering sale items and occasional promotional discounts on my products. I finally signed up for a google adwords account and have already begun two advertising campaigns. And, I have a brand new color laser printer on the way to help me create marketing materials for several more new ideas I have in the works. I am hopeful that this new enthusiasm I have felt over the past month will continue into 2010.

I'm Back

I honestly didn't realize just how badly I've been neglecting my blog until I logged in to make this post. 2008 was a tough year for me, both at my full time job and for my craft business. By the time Christmas came around I only had two wholesale customers, when just a year earlier I had six. Let's just say I wasn't the only one affected by the economy. Retail sales remained stagnant and my peak candle season passed by and I decided to take a break from marketing my craft business. It didn't feel like the right time to expand my online product inventory or attempt to gain new wholesale business, and I wasn't feeling very inspired. I have sold a few candles since Christmas, but none of the sales came as a result of any effort on my part. I go through these non-creative phases periodically, but generally I come out of them with a bang. That is what I hope happened today.

Today I felt sudden inspiration to work on a semi-new product. I got the idea last year to make recycled glass jar candles. I thought it would be a good way to demonstrate my belief that we must re-use as well as recycle, while offering a container candle to my customers for the first time. I collected some jars and made a few candles, but they were not quite as fabulously funky as I'd hoped. So, I put the project on hold... indefinitely. Then today I had an idea of a way to incorporate an art I previously explored but have not recently indulged with my candle business. I could decopage photos and other papers onto the recycled glass jars... I've been collecting my favorite pages of my daily travel calendar all year though I had no idea what I wanted to do with them yet. I spent the entire evening gathering pictures for my upcoming decopage experiment. I've got magazine clippings, old calendar pages, and a few decks of cards so far, which is definitely enough to get started.

And, while I was at the store picking up supplies for my project, I came across a magazine I'd never seen before called Artful Blogging. The stories I read inspired me to share more of my story as an artist through my blog... ideas, events, successes, frustrations, and revelations. Though I sometimes think of myself as just a candlemaker experimenting with other crafts, the truth is I am an artist. I hope the stories behind my creations will help you appreciate them even more.

http://www.stampington.com/html/artful_blogging.html

New Container Candles

My new container candles made in recycled jars are now for sale. I look forward to hearing what you think!

Reduce, REUSE, and Recycle

This winter, I've decided to add an item to my product line that reflects my desire to preserve the environment and fight global warming. I'm going to begin selling container candles using recycled glass containers and other miscellaneous items I've collected that would otherwise end up in the trash.

Glass production releases extremely harmful fossil fuels into the air, thus I'd like to offer my customers an additional way to reuse and recycle their glass. Collect your glass jars and send them to me. For every 6 "new" jars you give me to turn into candles, I'll send you one back for free. If you clean out your container candles after your finished burning them, I'll "refill" them for you at half price. (I recommend floating the container in a warm bath to help loosen stubborn wax.) Together we can lessen the carbon footprint caused by glass production.

References:

http://www.greenstudentu.com/Glass.aspx